Explanation: After Caesar had conquered Gaul, his term of governorship was over, and he was vulnerable to prosecution by his political foes. As a populare, a supporter of the lower classes, he had made many enemies amongst the optimates, the reactionaries, who scuttled an acceptable compromise which would have allowed Caesar to not be executed for nebulous reasons. Given the choice of being executed or waiting for the Senate to muster their armies and march on him, he chose a third option - to overthrow the Senate which threatened him.
Thank you so much for the explanations here. I usually know the gist of the reference, but I really like being reminded of the specifics. I wish we could have more such context comments in other communities. I really appreciate that you do so in so many of your posts! Even just the link to the museum for artifacts is so great.
Explanation: After Caesar had conquered Gaul, his term of governorship was over, and he was vulnerable to prosecution by his political foes. As a populare, a supporter of the lower classes, he had made many enemies amongst the optimates, the reactionaries, who scuttled an acceptable compromise which would have allowed Caesar to not be executed for nebulous reasons. Given the choice of being executed or waiting for the Senate to muster their armies and march on him, he chose a third option - to overthrow the Senate which threatened him.
Thank you so much for the explanations here. I usually know the gist of the reference, but I really like being reminded of the specifics. I wish we could have more such context comments in other communities. I really appreciate that you do so in so many of your posts! Even just the link to the museum for artifacts is so great.
Always happy to help out a little!